Craft beer - coming of the Messiah or a passing fad?

Tom Dunne · 30-06-2014 9:50am #1

In keeping with our tradition here on BGRH of debating the issues that matter, I draw your attention to current discourse on the matter of craft beer.

To some, it is literally the coming of the Messiah, liberation from the shackles of dull, flavourless liquid, masquerading as beer, the dawn of a new era of beery goodness.

To others, it is an abomination, nothing more than beer for metrosexuals with all it's "hoppy flavour" and "fruit overtones". Give me a pint of plain any day.

So, esteemed members of BGRH, where do you stand on the issue?

The Hill Billy · 30-06-2014 10:23am

While I can appreciate a well-crafted ale I find that most of them have too distinctive a flavour to have more than one or two in a row. I like something I can sup for an evening. Yeah, pint of plain for me with an occasional toe dipped in a hipstery craft beer.

jester77 · 30-06-2014 10:30am

Define craft?

Is the fantastic trappist beers that the monks have been producing for centuries considered craft? Or is it just a term associated with all the new micro-breweries that have started popping up over the last decade or 2.

Either way, I still like a tasty beer. I have grown out of the binge drinking way of consuming beer and these days I much prefer to sit and have 3 or 4 quality tasting beers. Give me a quality imperial stout or trappist beer any day of the week over a bland lager or pils that needs to be chilled just to make it drinkable.

Tom Dunne · 30-06-2014 10:49am

jester77 wrote: »

Define craft?

Non-mass produced, commercial. Small, independent breweries making beer from the tears of angels.

Tom Dunne · 30-06-2014 2:26pm

The Hill Billy wrote: »

While I can appreciate a well-crafted ale I find that most of them have too distinctive a flavour to have more than one or two in a row.

I put it to you that craft beer is not intended to be drank like regular beer, but more to be savoured like a fine wine.

Not that I condone drinking wine.....

Micky Dolenz · 30-06-2014 2:34pm

I think craft beer is here to stay and only becoming more popular. I read there are over 1000 breweries in the UK with nearly 300 opening over the last couple of years. I'm not sure of the Irish number. But it seems everyone is at it, pro and amateur alike.

I'm all for it. I spent a glorious beer filled year in Brussels a while back and it really made me appreciate the beery goodness. The commercial big names tasted like water flavoured beer after it.

I tasted a beer recently, which is quite apt for the here. It had a smoky flavour and it almost tasted like bacon. It was yum if weird. I must find out the name of it. I go to a craft beer bar every Monday night. They constantly change the beer

Hurray for Mondays

Tom Dunne · 30-06-2014 7:37pm

Micky Dolenz wrote: »

I tasted a beer recently, which is quite apt for the here. It had a smoky flavour and it almost tasted like bacon. It was yum if weird. I must find out the name of it. I go to a craft beer bar every Monday night. They constantly change the beer

Goddammit man, find out the name of that beer, the producer, the importer, the truck delivery guy and the barman who serves it.

Don't tease us like that.

Zaph · 01-07-2014 1:18am

This beer really has it all - bacony, doughnuty, maple flavoured goodness. No idea if it's available here, but Voodoo's black lager is. I seriously recommend getting your hands on some.

But to answer the original question - craft beer, hell yeah!

Robbo · 01-07-2014 2:48pm

I think we're approaching "peak craft" at the moment. Based on no market research bar my own lushing, I think there'll be a trend towards consolidation. I'm enjoying the hell out of it and indeed my local is a craft mecca but I'm not sure how long it will last.

It seems that every disused shed in the land is being colonised by bearded gents trying to make an IPA that's slighlty different from what the chap down the road is doing with the same kit and expertise gleaned from t'Internet. We're one step away from being the Real Ale Twats from Viz. For the love of Jeff, I was drinking one that was brewed in Offaly, of all places, recently.

Also, I'm pretty sure some of the "hoppier" brews are the result of a misheard instruction and instead of "moar hops", they added in copper sulphate.

Don't get me started about awful "creation myth" blurbs on the side of the bottle...

jester77 · 01-07-2014 3:38pm

Robbo wrote: »

I think we're approaching "peak craft" at the moment. Based on no market research bar my own lushing, I think there'll be a trend towards consolidation. I'm enjoying the hell out of it and indeed my local is a craft mecca but I'm not sure how long it will last.

It seems that every disused shed in the land is being colonised by bearded gents trying to make an IPA that's slighlty different from what the chap down the road is doing with the same kit and expertise gleaned from t'Internet. We're one step away from being the Real Ale Twats from Viz. For the love of Jeff, I was drinking one that was brewed in Offaly, of all places, recently.

Also, I'm pretty sure some of the "hoppier" brews are the result of a misheard instruction and instead of "moar hops", they added in copper sulphate.

Don't get me started about awful "creation myth" blurbs on the side of the bottle...

You are right about peak. Hops are in short supply, I was reading the large breweries were consuming around 70% of the hop harvest 5 or 6 years ago. Now they are only consuming 40%. This is due to the micro brewery explosion and the fact that craft beers require up to 6 times as much hops to produce as the mainstream beers. They are expecting there to be a hop shortage next year.

Micky Dolenz · 01-07-2014 3:40pm

We may need to hop on that investment

emo72 · 01-07-2014 3:49pm

I grow hops in the garden. Will I be rich?

Robbo · 01-07-2014 3:49pm

jester77 wrote: »

You are right about peak. Hops are in short supply, I was reading the large breweries were consuming around 70% of the hop harvest 5 or 6 years ago. Now they are only consuming 40%. This is due to the micro brewery explosion and the fact that craft beers require up to 6 times as much hops to produce as the mainstream beers. They are expecting there to be a hop shortage next year.

Buy high! Sell low!

Tom Dunne · 01-07-2014 4:24pm

emo72 wrote: »

I grow hops in the garden. Will I be rich?

How big is your garden?

Micky Dolenz · 01-07-2014 4:26pm

Tom Dunne wrote: »

How big is your garden?

Worst chat up line ever?

emo72 · 01-07-2014 4:56pm

Micky Dolenz wrote: »

Worst chat up line ever?

Not making this up but it's huge. Late in the summer when I'm in the garden looking at all the hops in flower, I get a mighty thirst. Must grow more hops!

lil_lisa · 01-07-2014 9:41pm

I honestly think it is the rebirth of the age of beer. Its different here in the US. Before prohibition there were thousands upon thousands of breweries in this country. Every town had a local bar/restaurant that brewed and served their own beer. Then, law stepped in and changed the craft beer world over here. For the last 20 years, breweries have been making a comeback and popping up left right and center. I feel like its been having a rippling affect across the world too and pushing for a lot of competition and innovation everywhere. Which has just been fantastic! More beer for us to enjoy

Tom Dunne · 02-07-2014 6:39am

They say you never forget your first.

It was summer time, circa 2004, Oregon, in the Pacific Northwest of the US, in a beer garden. A slightly less rotund and more hairy Tom Dunne was sitting on a bench under a tree in the shade. The grass swayed in the light breeze, flies could be heard buzzing nearby.

The waiter had just informed me that they don't serve any commercial beer, only their own brews. After a brief moment of horror, and with the authority of a teenager struggling in the dark with his first brastrap, I pointed to one on the menu.

Firefly Kolsch it was, the name evoking images of a tiny insect guiding me to a nirvana of hoppy goodness.

To my horror, when the beer arrived, it had a slice of lemon in it. My learned colleagues told my that was the norm in this parish. Somewhat hesitantly, I sipped. I then gulped. I then fell off the bench because a hornet landed on my other hand and I screamed like a girl. Big feckers they are.

It was an instant attraction. From this tender moment, a love affair began between man and craft beer.

Zaph · 02-07-2014 7:41am

I've said it before and I'll say it again - fruit has no place in beer. And whatever about the Americans weird insistence in putting fruit into hefeweizen, wtf was it doing anywhere near a Kolsch??? I am truly shocked and appalled.

jester77 · 02-07-2014 9:54am

Zaph wrote: »

I've said it before and I'll say it again - fruit has no place in beer. And whatever about the Americans weird insistence in putting fruit into hefeweizen, wtf was it doing anywhere near a Kolsch??? I am truly shocked and appalled.

Banana in Hefeweizen is very common here in Germany. Don't knock the fruit, you should try some of the Belgian Lambic beers, they are great.

Robbo · 02-07-2014 11:18am

Micky Dolenz wrote: »

Worst chat up line ever?

Roadside frontage?

Zaph · 02-07-2014 1:15pm

jester77 wrote: »

Banana in Hefeweizen is very common here in Germany. Don't knock the fruit, you should try some of the Belgian Lambic beers, they are great.

It's not the making of fruit flavoured beer that I object to, although most of the ones I've tasted have been too sweet for my liking, it's the addition of pieces of fruit to an otherwise perfectly fine glass of beer that I have a problem with. And a banana in my beer is just plain wrong, although I have had banana bread beer and it was pretty interesting. One of those ones that you'd enjoy but not necessarily want a second.

Tom Dunne · 02-07-2014 1:31pm

Zaph wrote: »

It's not the making of fruit flavoured beer that I object to, although most of the ones I've tasted have been too sweet for my liking, it's the addition of pieces of fruit to an otherwise perfectly fine glass of beer that I have a problem with. And a banana in my beer is just plain wrong, although I have had banana bread beer and it was pretty interesting. One of those ones that you'd enjoy but not necessarily want a second.

Hold on there a minute.

If memory serves me correctly, and it doesn't normally, don't you put pineapple on pizzas?

Zaph · 02-07-2014 1:34pm

Pineapple on pizza is perfectly acceptable and should be encouraged. I've had apple on pizza once. That's not something I care to repeat.

Tom Dunne · 02-07-2014 1:43pm

Zaph wrote: »

Pineapple on pizza is perfectly acceptable and should be encouraged.

:eek:

NewCorkLad · 02-07-2014 1:53pm

Zaph wrote: »

Pineapple on pizza is perfectly acceptable and should be encouraged. I've had apple on pizza once. That's not something I care to repeat.

Tom Dunne wrote: »

:eek:

Im with Zaph on the pineapple

Micky Dolenz · 02-07-2014 1:57pm

The cherry version is like liquidised marzipan.

On the pineapple on pizza buzz, not my thing but I would eat it before I eat a pizza with those horrible little fish.

Tom Dunne · 02-07-2014 2:05pm

I was in the UK last summer, walking along a bridge when I spotted a lovely bar by the river bank.

I remarked to my friends that we really should nip in there for a pint, at which point they reminded me that I had spent an hour there the previous night with them.

That was swiftly followed by "so you don't remember drinking that strawberry beer I ordered you then?" Clearly, it made an impression on me. An abomination, I tell you.

NewCorkLad · 02-07-2014 2:19pm

I am hoping it is the coming of the messiah because I have only discovered the nectar that is craft beer and wont be going back to the standard lagers again. I would love to know how many craft breweries do people think Ireland will be able to support as more seem to be popping up all the time?

trout · 02-07-2014 3:07pm

Zaph wrote: »

Pineapple on pizza is perfectly acceptable and should be encouraged.

Truefact.

Zaph · 02-07-2014 4:57pm

Micky Dolenz wrote: »

The cherry version is like liquidised marzipan.

You say that like it's a good thing.

Craft beer - coming of the Messiah or a passing fad?

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